Patrik Ervell’s Fall/Winter is Coming

Menswear designer Patrik Ervell is known for utilizing innovative and unusual fabrics, and his Fall/Winter 2014 collection follows suit. He sent high-tech fabrics down the runway to create a futuristic and athletic spin on men’s workwear. To promote the collection, Ervell released an inter-galactic inspired film. Directed by Daniel Sannwald, whom the designer has collaborated with once before, the film portrays two dancers in Ervell’s sleek designs. “I wanted to work with dancers instead of models to capture more expressive movement,” Ervell explains. Although the dancers are both classically trained and work with the Random Dance Company in London, their choreography is entirely improvised. “I kept asking them to try to be less elegant in their movements but it was hard for them,” laughs Ervell.

The film further defines the collection’s futurist theme; transporting the viewer into an alternate dimension, where aliens roam and bodies fuse together like the goo in a lava lamp. The dancers sway and contort their bodies to an eerie track by Real Lies, moving as if they’re floating in outer space free from the pull of gravity. The bass fades in and out as the their faces and bodies morph into one another through digital modifications. “I think it’s important to build a context for the clothes. But it also feels a bit like decorating a cake after it’s been made,” notes the designer.